Orono, Maine -- The University of Maine women's basketball (15-8, 8-2) team looks to extend its win streak to seven straight when it hosts Hartford (14-9, 6-4) on Monday evening at the Cross Insurance Center at 7 p.m. The Black Bears have won five in a row against the Hawks, including a 59-44 victory earlier this season in Hartford...

That was just a weird, puzzling, ugly game. After starting the game off on an impressive 16-4 run, the Black Bears looked out of sorts throughout most of this contest. The 28 turnovers are puzzling particularly because 1) Maine has averaged just under nine turnovers in its last six games and 2) Maine absolutely shredded Hartford's full-court press a few weeks ago at Hartford. Additionally, the unforced turnovers down the stretch were reminiscent of the Binghamton game in early January when Maine committed 25 turnovers. Maine's stellar three-point shooting as well as the offensive (and defensive) heroics of Blanca Millan kept Maine in this game. KJ came up big off the bench with seven boards and a basket. Even though it was not one of her best games, Tanesha came up huge with a strong game-winning drive.

For all of the negatives, Maine was able to pull out the W despite putting forth one of its worst performances in conference play this year. Let's also not forget that this is a solid Hartford team - one that blew out UNH by 30+ and Albany by 15 in the conference opener. The Black Bears just need to be more consistent with taking care of the ball (something it had done in its six previous games), otherwise it could find itself on the wrong end of tournament game next month.

dunbar: Not as bad as the few Maine's men wins this year so far (4 wins against D-1 competition) except for the UNH game certainly not the latest win over Binghamton where they almost gave the game away like they did that Stonybrook game at SB early in the conference schedule.

BETTER TO PLAY POORLY LIKE THE WOMEN DID TONIGHT AND WIN THEN TO PLAY GOOD AND LOSE, ESPECIALLY COME THE ONE AND DONE SEASON OF WIN OR GO HOME TOURNAMENT SEASON COME NEXT MONTH IN PORTLAND.

For all of the negatives, Maine was able to pull out the W despite putting forth one of its worst performances in conference play this year. Let's also not forget that this is a solid Hartford team - one that blew out UNH by 30+ and Albany by 15 in the conference opener. The Black Bears just need to be more consistent with taking care of the ball (something it had done in its six previous games), otherwise it could find itself on the wrong end of tournament game next month.

Agreed - it wasn't pretty at all, but happy to see the W against a very good Hartford team. We definitely need to clean up those turnovers though before March rolls around. As you mentioned, it seems Maine had been doing a terrific job in that area over the past few games, so hopefully this game is just an anomaly. It was nice to see the team able to pull a win out of a close game... maybe it's just selective memory, but it seems like in past years, Maine always came out on the wrong side of pretty much every close game. This year, it seems Maine has done a better job of being able to come out on top in (at least some of) those close games, by keeping things together while still being aggressive in the last 1-2 minutes of play - that was a huge basket at the end by Tanesha, and clutch free throws by Dor. Let's hope we continue to see this same fight (and hopefully less turnovers...) in these last few games of the regular season.

KJ's contributions in this game were absolutely crucial as well. She's never going to be our biggest offensive threat (which is fine) - I think ever since settling into her clearer role over the past 1-2 years (rebounds + tough defensive + sometimes dishing it out to Julie/Blanca/Dor for the open 3), she has been playing with more confidence overall, on both ends of the court. She was getting key rebounds for us this game when it mattered most - I don't think we would win that game without her. It's been really nice seeing both her & Parise develop over the past year or so into truly impactful role players on this team. So glad we have them both.

Geno Auriemma has said that every team has a bad game in a tournament. The trick is to win your bad game so you stay alive. If you look at the last six games of the AE women's season as a tournament, then maybe last night was Maine's bad game. And, somehow, Maine managed to give away the ball 28 times and still win. Let's hope there isn't another bad game in these remaining five.

Maine's entire team was sluggish. Wondered if some cold or flu bug had got into the locker room and infected everyone. I haven't seen that many soft passes all season, let alone in one game. As if nobody had the strength to make a baseball pass or a two-handed bounce pass into the post. And Maine seemed a step slower, too, though Hartford is quick and can make its opponents look slow by comparison.

Maine hasn't been able to stop Darby Lee in the latest two or three games. She has a good combination of power and quickness and court awareness, but others have held her way below 24. Fortunately, Maine again made a near non-factor of Lindsey Abed, holding her well below her average again.

Maybe what helped Maine most, though, was off the court. Hartford dressed only eight players. One of them (Mary Pattison, No. 10, I believe) was being worked on by the trainer between halves and wasn't a huge factor in the game, though she did spell Abed and Alexia Douglas for a total of 15 minutes. In both games against Maine, Hartford was missing No. 2 (D'Acosta), and she played really well against Maine last year. With a full bench, Hartford might have been able to give more rest to some of its kids. It looked to me as if Hartford was tiring in the late going and running more on adrenalin than on energy. Not all of the team, but several. Knowing the bench was so short, I was surprised that Hartford pressed so much. But the pressing had a great deal to do with Maine's 28 turnovers.

Unlike previous Maine teams, these kids showed a lot of grit by coming back after blowing what had looked like a safe lead. For not the first time, I said TG for TS (Thank God for Tanesha Sutton) last night when she delivered the winning bucket. Though I sit in the ninth row, I could almost see the fire and determination in her eyes as she drove for that go-ahead layup. I believe that had Tanesha not spent so much time on the bench to prevent foul trouble, Maine might have had a somewhat better time of it.

One other thing to note. Three years ago when a kid who had scored more than 2,000 points in high school came down to UMaine from Van Buren, who would have predicted that she would be used by the coach in an offense-defense situation late in a close game? But that's how Coach Vachon used Parise Rossignol last night, with Parise on the defense and Dor on the offense late in the fourth quarter. Parise's defense has become one of a number of her strengths that not many of us would have predicted. She is becoming a complete player.

We'll learn something about UNH on Thursday. It was 5-1 when Maine went into Durham and knocked it off. That was the first of three losses of the next four, including a 35-point pasting by Hartford, then last night UNH lost to Vermont. UNH did not do any better at solving Hannah Clymer of UVM than Maine had done last month here. This time, though, Sydney Smith stepped up for UVM, too. She pretty much mailed it in against Maine. Will the Wildcats come in here dispirited or will they be angry and fired up? They have Brittany Lai, the senior and very good point, back from injury but they still have a short bench. UNH was the pre-season pick, wasn't it, and is now 6-5 and tied for fourth with Hartford. Maine and Albany each has a two-game lead now on No. 3 Bingo. Maine has better speed than UNH. Wonder if Maine will pressure the ball a lot, that is, play a Hartford-style game against UNH.

Terribly disappointed by the crowds that Maine is not drawing. Do people not understand how well this team is doing? It's been a crappy winter for weather, but I have seen much larger crowds than Maine had last night that came out in heavy snow and high winds. It's a good team, and a couple of Maine kids are important parts of the team.

Great recap as always, Bob. This is certainly an interesting conference to watch this year for the women's program, isn't it?

There have been nights when I've wished the AE games weren't all played at the same time (or close to it), as it seems there's always at least one other matchup that I'd be curious to watch which is going on during that same time. Binghamton and Hartford are particularly fascinating to me, as it seems they both have very high ceilings, but also both had VERY rough games on their home courts against Maine. Part of me was surprised to see that UVM upset UNH last night, but part of me wasn't surprised at all - even in the earlier games that UNH won, it seemed to barely be squeaking by. I'm still not sure what changed with their team between last year and this year (they retained the bulk of their roster - everyone except Kristen Anderson, I believe), but they are definitely not the dominant force that everyone seemed to have predicted they would be. And yet, of their past five games, their one and only win has been over Albany.... go figure. I'm very curious to see how Maine does against them on Thursday night.

Terribly disappointed by the crowds that Maine is not drawing. Do people not understand how well this team is doing? It's been a crappy winter for weather, but I have seen much larger crowds than Maine had last night that came out in heavy snow and high winds. It's a good team, and a couple of Maine kids are important parts of the team.

Agreed 100%! The ESPN commentator mentioned that it was a "good crowd" at the Cross Center, but it certainly didn't look like it from TV!!! Hope the Thursday game draws better. As you mentioned, we're seeing a couple Northern Maine kids making an impact on this program - I'm surprised that hasn't played more of a factor in drawing slightly bigger crowds as well. It really is a fun team to watch this year.

It does seem like they are doing a lot of promotion for the one home weekend game left (vs. Albany on Feb 25th - the last game of the regular season); that could be a big one, let's hope we can get a ROCKING Cross Center for that.

Last edited by mainah57 on Thu Feb 08, 2018 5:46 pm, edited 1 time in total.

UMaine women's basketball fans: We better hope that the women will "Live by the three and not die by the three" come tournament time in the one and done win or go home season. The rim gets smaller and the ball gets bigger with the pressure of having to survive a bad shooting night as to win a tournament you usually have to be able to play or shoot poorly and still find away to move on.

I would not bet any money on any team high school boys or girls or college men's and women's teams "Who live and die by the three". And there are very few if any that I have seen this season boys or girls that don't gamble on the three ball. It's OK to lose several regular season games dying by the three, but not OK when it is if you die by the three in the tournament.

Women's crowds have sucked this year. No energy, almost like they feel like its a crime to make noise and/or stand up. It sucks the energy out of the building.

Put this into perspective:

There's only one thing that gets these people off their butts. I tap off the Stein Song with 24 seconds to go in a one point game, just to see if that gets them up. No reaction whatsoever. Shameful. Might as well play in an empty arena.

When men's games are more lively while the building is considerably more empty, that's a real problem.